2024 Green Grants Award #14: Virginia Living Museum

Congratulations to the Virginia Living Museum for an award of $1,000 for their Green Grants Recycling

The Virginia Living Museum in Newport News has been connecting people to nature through educational experiences that promote conservation since 1966. More than a quarter-million guests—about half of them children—enjoy science education each year through hands-on living exhibits, programs, and events.

Beginning in the summer of 2023, the Museum’s Green Teen Conservation Leaders (high school-age volunteers) launched an environmental sustainability project at the Museum, in partnership with staff, to collect and record trash from adjacent Deer Park Lake, perform waste audits across the Museum campus, and use the information gained to develop strategies to improve the management waste and recyclables across the Museum campus, while building public awareness about recycling and sustainability.

In October 2023, they performed a waste audit at selected trash and recycling containers over several days, measuring the amount, type, and percentages of waste and recyclables thrown away in the Museum’s public-facing areas. Through this process, they developed an estimate of the total poundage of recycling and trash to determine the Museum’s overall recycling rate. Based on the data collected, they determined that an average of only 55% of the total recyclable materials are being correctly recycled, most of which are aluminum cans and plastic bottles. They observed that recycling is not closely monitored due to limited staff capacity and that a significant proportion of recyclable material is getting thrown out in the regular trash by guests.

To address these issues, they researched successful recycling programs as models, set a goal to increase the recycling rate to at least 80% and decrease overall landfill waste. They collaborated to develop strategies as part of an action plan to improve sustainability at the Museum over time. The Green Teens’ recommended strategies to improve the Museum’s waste and recycling include the installation of new, additional recycling receptacles both indoors and outdoors, new signage to educate the public, streamlining recycling policies and procedures, increased monitoring by staff and volunteers, and a campaign of public education and awareness over the next year.

With funds from their Green Grants award, the museum will purchase new recycling receptacles, making it easier for Museum guests to dispose of trash and recycle plastic and aluminum items correctly and easily. The grant would also allow the Green Teens and museum staff to continue to collect data through periodic waste/recycling audits to determine if the new receptacles, new signage, and public awareness efforts are effective in improving the Museum’s recycling rate. With an average of 770 guests coming through the Museum’s doors each day, the opportunity to effect change and support its environmental conservation mission is immense.

Thank you for the work you’re doing at the Virginia Living Museum to serve as a model for recycling and sustainability!